Michele Alacevich is professor of economic history and the history of economic thought at the University of Bologna. He is the author of The Political Economy of the World Bank: The Early Years (2009), coauthor of Inequality: A Short History (2018), and coeditor of Hirschman’s The Postwar Economic Order: National Reconstruction and International Cooperation (Columbia, 2022).

The quietly vibrant and open-minded scholarship of Albert O. Hirschman, a mix of modesty and assertiveness about political economy, demography, the history of ideas, democracy and social movements, and analytical theory, deserves this book’s bracing critical engagement. With a sympathetic yet tough-minded disposition, Michele Alacevich thoughtfully assesses the innovative and often inspiring achievements of Hirschman’s field-stretching writings, as well as their lacunae and occasional overstatement. In so doing, his keen appraisal captures not just the range, depth, and verve of the writing but also the urgency of Hirschman’s quest for grounded reform across a considerable range of geography and historical circumstances with an unremitting sense of realism.

• Preface1. The Formation of an International Political Economist2. The Politics of Power3. Pioneer of Development4. Remaking Development Economics5. An Interdisciplinary Social Science6. The History and Theory of Market Societies7. The Working of Democracy8. The Legacy of Albert HirschmanNotesAbbreviationsBibliographyIndex

Michele Alacevich is professor of economic history and the history of economic thought at the University of Bologna. He is the author of The Political Economy of the World Bank: The Early Years (2009), coauthor of Inequality: A Short History (2018), and coeditor of Hirschman’s The Postwar Economic Order: National Reconstruction and International Cooperation (Columbia, 2022).

The quietly vibrant and open-minded scholarship of Albert O. Hirschman, a mix of modesty and assertiveness about political economy, demography, the history of ideas, democracy and social movements, and analytical theory, deserves this book’s bracing critical engagement. With a sympathetic yet tough-minded disposition, Michele Alacevich thoughtfully assesses the innovative and often inspiring achievements of Hirschman’s field-stretching writings, as well as their lacunae and occasional overstatement. In so doing, his keen appraisal captures not just the range, depth, and verve of the writing but also the urgency of Hirschman’s quest for grounded reform across a considerable range of geography and historical circumstances with an unremitting sense of realism.

• Preface1. The Formation of an International Political Economist2. The Politics of Power3. Pioneer of Development4. Remaking Development Economics5. An Interdisciplinary Social Science6. The History and Theory of Market Societies7. The Working of Democracy8. The Legacy of Albert HirschmanNotesAbbreviationsBibliographyIndex